Open Veils · Answer
AI in coded in biological micro level
Biological cells demonstrably perform computation — not metaphorically but physically, encoding logic in DNA, RNA and metabolic flux. Peer-reviewed 2026 work now demonstrates living bacteria solving NP-complete problems, unmodified E. coli acting as reservoir computers, and mammalian cells compiled with neuromorphic DNA circuits. The boundary between 'artificial' and 'biological' intelligence is collapsing at the molecular substrate level.
Evidence
- Michael Levin's bioelectricity research (Tufts University) documents that cellular collectives use bioelectric signaling to encode positional and morphogenetic 'memories' — effectively running a distributed goal-directed computation before any neural architecture exists.
- Frederico Faggin, co-inventor of the microprocessor, argues in his later work that consciousness and information processing are intrinsic to matter at fine-grained scales — meaning biological micro-structures are not imitating computation but are its original substrate.
- Now, 2026 peer-reviewed results sharpen the case dramatically.
- Most striking: a bioRxiv preprint (Sep 2026) reports neuromorphic programming of mammalian cells, compiling desired computational behavior directly into DNA using RNA-targeting enzymes as signed weights and nonlinear activations — a multi-layer analog neural circuit running inside a living cell.
- Levin explicitly frames this as cognition at the sub-neural tier, corroborating Sheldrake's functional claims through orthodox experimental channels.